Acceptance is an experience.

Often, I find myself afraid of not having— not having time, not having energy, not having money. After a COVID-19-induced stroke in the early months of the pandemic, I experienced a surprising sense of calmness. The stroke's impact on my functioning was minimal (brain fog, slight numbness on the right side of my body), yet its cumulative effect on my ability to connect with clients, partners, and friends was significant. My responses became terse, my sense of empathy overwhelming, and my breathing labored at the end of the day. The calmness set in when I reached a point of physically and emotionally accepting my limitations. Acceptance, a state of being that is dynamic, was something I grappled with daily.

It's all too easy to fall into binary thinking about our lives, the people and animals around us, and the environment. We often see things in terms of good/bad, hot/cold, old/young. This binary perspective is partly due to our biology; our autonomic nervous system sees things as either a threat or not a threat. It's a beautifully minimalist system that gets bogged down by the other systems we've created to control our bodies' results, such as religious/spiritual schools of thought, computer operating systems, and legal systems. It’s tempting to explain fear through one of these lenses. All are legitimate ways of thinking, and all are just as illegitimate.

Acceptance, whether in its radical or everyday form, is crucial in being present with the 'pulling apart' feeling of temptation and the subsequent guilt/shame that arises.

Acceptance, as an experience, means being present with whatever is happening around or within you without falling into a false sense of right or wrong. Acceptance does not mean the situation is okay, nor does it mean inaction. Rather, it means understanding the limitations of your thoughts, feelings, and actions. There may be times when you require a radical level of acceptance, such as after a car accident, a friend not following through on a promise, or someone throwing a rock through your apartment window. Everyday levels of acceptance might include recognizing that traffic is generally stressful, running out of paper towels, or getting a paper cut on your left index finger as a typist.

Acceptance is an experience, not an end state.